Gave this one as a gift - Opus Magnum.

Fun and satisfying production puzzler.

Twilight Town, a cyberpunk boomer shooter about a guy wanting to give a body to his AI gf.

Element TD2

Necesse has been fun

Caves of Qud

Can someone help me remember the name of a certain game? I heard about it in an LTT video. Apparently it's a really cheap 8(+?)-player Steam game that is a sort of magic/wizard free-for-all game that's lots of fun with little strategy. I've been racking my brain trying to remember the name of it.

I bought Touhou Artificial Dreams In Arcadia during the October sale and it is a bit of a hidden gem for fans of the old SMT JRPG games on SNES. I also picked up Lunacid but have not got that far in it, but it seems like a strong revival of the classic Kings Field games.

Probably not much this time. I don't think Dredge really falls under lesser known, but I might pick that up. I'll probably get House Flipper 2 - the first one was one of my go-tos for destressing, so I'm hoping the sequel will fill the same niche. Otherwise, I've either bought most of what I've been looking at in previous sales or played it on gamepass/ea play.

Eidolon

For less than $5 CAD, I picked up Maiden & Spell, an excessively cute sidescrolling shooter a la R-Type, except it's a levelless boss rush with Story and Versus modes. It's got a very Touhou aesthetic (i.e. rather than spaceships or dragons or something, everyone is cute girls).

Story mode is basically a Touhou boss rush, where your character fights 4 monster girls and 2 out of the other 3 human girls, with no level in-between, it's just bosses. There's a threadbare but acceptable story linking them, with each playable character giving a different perspective on the same story, and then there being an epilogue chapter and a bonus extra boss. Story mode has 4 difficulties, the easiest of which is called Cute Mode and is basically unloseable, so even if you've never played a game like this, you can give it a go.

Versus mode is basically a 1v1 fighting game. You and one friend each pick one of the 8 girls and do bullet hells at each other until you see who wins. It's not complex, but it is kind of tactically deep.

The same author is currently working on a sequel, Rabbit & Steel, a very similar game except rather than a versus battler, it's a coop roguelike inspired by MMO raid mechanics. A sneak-peek demo with online multiplayer is available, and it's really fun!

I didn't buy them this year but

• Software Inc, management game

• Ostriv, 18th century city building game

• Off-road Mania, 4x4 trials game

Songs of conquest and street of rogue

I bought The Making of Karateka. Not exactly a game, more like a playable documentary (akin with Atari 50 anniversary collection).

I have shitload of indie games with a fun ideas that I have never really played, but wanted to support.

Isn't Black Mesa called Half Life?

Black Mesa is so fucking good.

Unforgettable voyage. Looks like a cute little puzzle game.